Woman Before an Aquarium

by Pam Wolfson

Woman before an Aquarium 

(painted by Matisse)

She misses her lover. The model rests her chin upon her hands and shuts her mouth tight. Her searing eyes follow the fish in the raised bowl. How she envies their mindless swimming in the warm southern light.

Beside the bowl, five pinecones stand on an evergreen branch. They tilt like a firm embodiment of the fish. Their scales are open, their seeds flew off, days before, in the wind. How she’d love to fling out her arms and dance after a long afternoon of posing.

Matisse, the master, leans toward her intently. His thumb is locked in the palette’s hole, his brush poised mid-air. To him, she is a figure, an anchor against the Moroccan screen with its blue circles cut by diagonals. A strong green stripe rises behind her head.

She has not slept well for a week. Her lover left to work in a Paris. He found Nice, with its sparkling shore and long boulevards, dull. Moments ago, Matisse placed a white paper by her elbow. “This slanted line will balance the scene.” For her, this blank page is an invitation. Will her lover write her a letter or, better yet, dream of her in this soft dress?

Her thick hair hides her ears and her eyelids begin to lower. The shadows on her forearms deepen, and the fish slow down. As she drifts off, evening turns lavender upon the table. Matisse will not mind and will keep painting. In the quiet studio, high above the darkening bay, he will relish the curves of her body beside the still fish.